I do this all the time. My husband has learned, obviously, that if I'm staring at the computer when he starts talking, I might not register anything at all, even though I pretend I'm listening. And when there are a lot of people around, all having their own conversations, no one is really surprised if I then ask, "Wait--what are you guys talking about?" because they assume I was in another conversation. But no one understands when I've been sitting there--looking at the speaker the whole time he or she was talking--and then suddenly come out with, "I'm sorry--what? I must have missed something." It's embarrassing for me and insulting to the speaker. So, I try to fake comprehension.

I used to tell people "The middle of a conversation is the most interesting part." because I never seemed to get the beginning, and didn't always follow through to the end.

The other day, a friend was talking to me and another lady about some conference she went to in Switzerland. The other lady said something about how difficult something was for women, in particular, and that it was good thing for somebody to be addressing. That's all the information I have about the 15-minute conversation. I wasn't doing anything else at the time, just drinking tea with them. Oh, and re-playing "The Time-Traveler's Wife" (which I saw on the flight from Atlanta to Frankfurt last March) in my head. I'd occasionally realize I was meant to be listening, and that's how I got what information I did.

__________________Farther away than you think
After nearly 10 years in the former USSR, the UK seems like a foreign country. I don't know who I'm meant to be or what I'm meant to do. So, at least some things haven't changed...Ninja posts!